Tabletop

The Metagame is a card game about culture, in which you share your opinions about practically everything: from music and movies to junk food and videogames. Designed to scale up to absurdly large groups, experimental game collective Local No. 12 funded the game with two successful Kickstarter projects from over 2,200 backers. Co-designer Eric Zimmerman (Gamelab, SiSSYFiGHT 2000) joins us from Brooklyn to show it off.

Bycatch is a card game about drone warfare—"flawed surveillance, impossible decisions, and the people caught in between." Simple to learn and quick to play, players use their phone cameras as surveillance devices, photographing each other's cards to hunt for suspected terrorists while sheltering their own citizens from attack. Brooklyn-based designer Subalekha Udayasankar will be at Tabletop to share her work.

A live-action role-playing game about being poor and black in America, &maybetheywontkillyou tasks participants with a simple walk to the local corner store, facing casual racism and harassment from law enforcement. Speak out or remain silent, and deal with the consequences—the choice is yours. We're excited to have LA-based game designer Akira Thompson at Tabletop to share his work.

Funded by a Kickstarter project that's raised $80k from over 1,600 people, with 11 days to go, The Contender is a social card game inspired by the absurdity of American presidential debates. Use facts, attacks, and distracts to convince the Moderator that you are fit to lead the free world, using hundreds of one-liners based on real presidential quotes. Designer John Teasdale is coming from San Francisco to share the latest version.

In the social card game Funemployed!, fake it until you make it by applying to real jobs with your questionable qualifications, crafting a narrative that will get you your next paycheck. The perfect outlet for fear and desperation in an uncertain job climate, designer Anthony Conta joins us from NYC to help polish your interviewing skills.

Deadbolt is an Indiecade-nominated game about personal truth and vulnerability, designed to rapidly create trust and intimacy through strangers. Only one copy exists, in the hands of designer Elizabeth Sampat, who will facilitate the game in its first-ever Portland appearance. Because of the nature of gameplay, Deadbolt will be played in a private space at Tabletop for participants only.

Last year, Two Rooms and a Boom was a huge hit at Tabletop, so we invited creators Alan Gerding and Sean McCoy back to show off the finished game. A fast-paced party game of social deduction, it's like Werewolf with a ticking time bomb. Groups of up to 30 people split into two teams, get assigned roles, and try to find the bomber and save the President in three tense, timed rounds.

Another surprise smash hit at Tabletop last year, Marrying Mr. Darcy is a role-playing/strategy card game inspired by Pride and Prejudice, designed by Twin Cities conductor-turned-game designer Erika Svanoe. Her newest addition, the Emma Expansion, adds "new characters, new events, and a lot more meddling." Oh, and zombies.